


Just Like Grace Kelly

by nausicaa_of_phaeacia



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Flying in Lola, Gen, Grace Kelly - Freeform, Hitchcock, Post Jiaying, Post-Season/Series 02, Prompt Fic, Rear Window, To Catch A Thief - Freeform, also featuring: the Playground's kitchen, skoulsonfest2k15redux
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-19
Updated: 2015-07-19
Packaged: 2018-04-10 03:38:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4375742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nausicaa_of_phaeacia/pseuds/nausicaa_of_phaeacia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Coulson and Skye flying in Lola.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Like Grace Kelly

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RowboatCop](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RowboatCop/gifts).



> For the skoulsonfest2k15 redux (day 3).
> 
> Prompt:  
> [GLOVES]
> 
> For those who don't know the movies: I'm referencing two scenes from Hitchcock's To Catch A Thief, and one from Hitchcock's Rear Window.
> 
> Hope you like it! :) Sorry it turned out a little silly/cheesy.  
> For the lovely RowboatCop.

It’s almost become a tradition between the two of them that they keep finding each other in the Playground’s kitchen at night. Not that there’s any choreography to it, but it keeps happening, and they’ve both come to accept it almost like another unwritten law of nature. Either Coulson’s there, reading a book, or Skye chooses it as a quiet, neutral spot for hacking, or they bump into each other trying to get a glass of milk or a cup of tea or a glass of bourbon to help them sleep.  
  
Although it has to be remarked that Skye’s been sleeping much better since Cal agreed to enter the T.A.H.I.T.I. program. Not that it doesn’t make her cry. But she finds it has made her nights calmer and less stormy. Coulson, not so much – the initial horror nightmares have vanished, but there’s still the occasional fit of phantom pain, and the lengthy discussions with Tony Stark and other experts about getting some kind of replacement or the other for his hand. Hunter’s suggested Extremis, but Coulson’s not so keen on having _another thing_ inside him that’s not part of standard human biology. Natasha’s been talking about Captain Rogers’ serum (sending Tony into a rambling fit about curious serum-type things he’s inherited from his father and has been keeping in the basement of a beautiful cottage somewhere) but keeps getting shushed by Simmons, who maintains that it would enhance Coulson but definitely not replace a limb (prompting Natasha to repeat she _knows_ that much but that it could kind of compensate for the loss of Coulson’s hand). All in all, times have been not-so-rosy for Coulson.  
  
And even though Skye knows she’s finally found closure with her father’s memory being replaced by things that have never happened and all (the future inside joke probably being that _this is so “Buffy”_ ), she can’t say she’s completely comfortable with her own spot in life yet. Alright, she may be Inhuman and a superhero goddess (in Hunter’s words) – slash – earthquake girl (in the Koenig’s vocabulary), she may know how to make things vibrate, but even though she’s learned to appreciate her “gift” (ever since Raina used the term, she doesn’t feel comfortable with it), she still feels she’s just that Rising Tide gone S.H.I.E.L.D. orphan hacker girl inside. Fitz helps, regularly assuring her she’s still the same person, but Skye can’t help splitting her two roles up sometimes. Breakfast, for example, breakfast is something that always makes her feel like she’s just evolved from van to bunk (and from illegal to badge-bearing). Or movie nights with Mack. Undercover missions, though, almost make her forget that she used to record podcasts in the middle of the night, or that she used to hack her way into HYDRA security systems for S.H.I.E.L.D.  
  
She’s not sure what these night-time bump-ins with Coulson make her feel like, though. They mostly mean pajama-clad-creeping-out-to-get-a-glass-of-milk S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Skye, or tiptoeing-barefoot-to-compromise-another-bad-guys-database-on-a-red-plastic-kitchen-chair hacker Skye, but they also mean wordlessly-hanging-out-with-the-other-alien-blood-guy earthquake alien Skye, so she can’t really categorize these meetings.  
  
Next time she runs into Coulson in the kitchen, catching him as he’s helping himself to another glass of bourbon (she’s not sure what precisely started the habit, but she can’t help feeling responsible to make sure he’s not overdoing it), he starts talking. More than usually (normally, it’s just the half-shy _Hi_ and you usual two-line small talk, then hours of kind of sitting next to each other). Skye’s not sure if he’s actually tipsy, but he ends up suggesting they take a ride in Lola the next day. It’s not the first time, of course, but it’s implied that this would be the first time he’d let her sit behind the wheel. Naturally, she accepts, trying really hard not to squeal out aloud, the chirpy-chimy tone of her voice still betraying her. He smirks, and she wonders if it’s actually possible to _smirk fondly_ .  
  
***  
  
It makes her happier than she expected to go for a ride with Coulson. Her father has just entered the T.A.H.I.T.I. program on the day before and she’s really glad to have some actual distraction (other than playing pingpong with Hunter or training with May). This time, Skye runs into him just after breakfast, a smile on his face.  
“You wanna fly, too?”  
“You mean – you mean I get to _fly Lola_ ?” The happy surprise in her voice almost makes him want to hug her. He nods, and she actually does a little happy dance behind the kitchen counter, coffee mug in hand. “Thanks, Coulson,” she chimes, swirling around the table to give him the tiniest peck on the cheek before she leaves the room, making him regret he didn’t suggest this earlier.  
  
Maybe it’s just the ridiculous amount of Hitchcocks and other vintage movies Skye’s gotten to watch lately (turns out Mack has a very soft spot for 1950s and 1960s movies), but when she and Coulson meet in Lola’s hangar in the late afternoon, he’s obviously fascinated by what she’s wearing: a high-waisted pastel skirt, a patterned blouse tucked into it. Her hair’s in a perfect bun and the only thing that breaks the image is the fact that she kind of tucked her vintage sunglasses into her hair. It takes him just that one moment longer to smile at her. As they get into the car, she surprises him by putting on white gloves. She smiles as she feels his eyes on her hands.  
Coulson knows he’s always been in danger of falling in love with the girl, and in the past, he’s actually felt accomplished that nothing obviously has happened between them. Seeing her like this, though, taking this ride in Lola so seriously, shining in this unusual, almost exotically elegant outfit, makes him realize just how much of a fool he’s been, just how dedicatedly he’s been fooling himself, especially during the past few months.  
  
“Just like Grace Kelly,” he manages as soon as he’s more or less regained his trademark _Phil Coulson_ cool, “the way you’re dressed”.  
It’s her time to smirk now. “Yeah, Mack’s lured me into his Hitchcock movie lair.”  
She looks at him, and they exchange a partners-in-crime grin.  
“Next stop: French riviera then,” he says in a deep radio moderator’s voice, and it proves hard to stop laughing when the person next to you keeps chuckling.  
  
***  
  
Skye doesn’t even remember when she’s had the last opportunity to just _forget everything else_ (not even the time she’d been out on a date with Steve Rogers counts as such, to be perfectly honest). They’ve spent the day just flying around in a safe out-of-direct-sight distance to the ground, stopping once to get some ice-cream (and Coulson getting excited like a little boy when she tells him she’s paying, and that he should pick more than just one flavour). They keep laughing about one thing or the other on the way back.  
Things have suddenly become so easy, and even though nothing of emotional depth happened during their flight, she finds herself unable to pinpoint the moment in which things with Coulson have turned this different. Of course, there’s always been this partners-in-crime relationship between them, evident from the minute she was picked up by S.H.I.E.L.D. as a Rising Tide member. But this is … different. She feels as though things have been improving so much that with him, she’s not forced to split up herself into wayward hacker agent girl and force-of-nature second-generation Inhuman anymore. It’s new.  
  
There is an awkward hug when they part ways to go to their bunks, and Skye’s surprised to notice that Coulson isn’t the first one to break the hug. Everything is just so … unofficial, suddenly, and it’s a struggle not to give him a good-night peck on the cheek. She resists. The look on his face when she doesn’t do it is kind of adorable, and she already regrets not having done it, and not having said more, but she figures that things of value always have to be taken not just very seriously, but also slowly. She kind of tiptoes away, opening her bun just as she’s swirling around the corner, leaving Coulson leaning against Lola, battling himself as he’s trying to define what this day has done to him.  
  
The knock on his door one or two hours later startles him. He opens it slowly, unsure if whoever is on the other side should actually be seeing him in his pajamas. It’s Skye, still wearing the blouse, but with her sweatpants. She’s not even smiling, but for some reason, he freezes in the doorframe as she approaches him. There is one brief, intense kiss before she just turns around and walks away. _Just like Grace Kelly._ He feels like a stupid schoolboy, not moving until she’s well down the corridor. The smile on his face is still there when he wakes up.  
  
***  
  
( **epilogue** )  
  
Months later, they’re still managing to keep their relationship a secret (at least, nobody has ever indicated that they know of anything). There’s this unfortunate moment, though, when Skye’s trying to sneak out of his bunk at dawn, her hair a mess, and bumps into Mack. What makes the whole thing goddamn perfect is that he knocks her rather small bag out of her hands, spilling the contents on the Playground corridor. They both get down on the floor immediately to pick things up, Skye afraid of blushing as the first thing Mack picks up is a sort of silky nightgown.  
  
Worried, she looks up at him, trying to decide how to explain things best, but he just smirks. “Just like Grace Kelly. Good girl.” He winks, and she mouthes a smirking _Thank you_ as she retreats back into Coulson’s bunk on tiptoe. “Bobbi and I are rewatching _Rear Window_ tonight, he tells her through the door. Wanna join?”  
She and Coulson exchange grins as he replies, “Count us in.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading! :)


End file.
